The present invention relates to an apparatus for the treatments of particles and biological cells. Particularly, the invention relates to a method of handling particles, a cell treatment equipment and a cell fusion processor.
An apparatus is known from Proceedings of the Spring Conference of the Japan Society of Precision Engineering, 1987, pages 845-846, and U.S. patent application Ser. No. 122,269 filed on Nov. 18, 1987, which apparatus is so designed that one pair each of different kind cells are supplied to each of microchambers arranged in a matrix-like pattern and are absorbed and held in a small aperture of the microchamber with the aid of an absorption nozzle and that the cell pair is then subjected to a cell treatment operation in each microchamber.
According to the prior art, use is made of a flowcell to pour cells into the microchamber at a rate of one cell at a time so as to provide a pair of the cells. According to this procedure, it is difficult to treat a large amount of cells for a short period of time and also to maintain the activity of the cells.